The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. THURSDAY, APRIL 27, 1882.

Kumara Times, Issue 1739, 27 April 1882, Page 2

The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. THURSDAY, APRIL 27, 1882.

The Golden Fleece Company deserve the thanks of the mining comnannity for their public spirit in introducing the diamond drill and rock-borer to .Reefton, and we hope the result will prove the wisdon of the undertaking. Not only in America, but also in the Australian colonies, the diamond drill has been the means of making great discoveries in raining, at a comparatively trifling expense, but even the diamond drill is not infallible, and the Company must not put implicit faith in its action, as it has been proved that it does not always bore straight. Strangely as it may seem the strata through which the drill passes affects its action. The Scotchman’s United mine at Stawell is a.case in point, and unfortunately not the first or only one where the the drill b s actually deviated more than forty or fifty feet from the place it should have been found in, although the distance bored is under 400 feet. When we consider that a diamond drill is 5000 times as lotig as- it. is thick, and bears the prop u-tious (.altering the scale) of a piece of piano wire 10 to 15 feet !on<r, the wonder is that it should be possible to bore with the slightest approximation to correctness, or to avoid deflecting into-almost a semicircle before completing the distance. Some method, then, of finding the actual position of any part of a diamond drill boie, before driving towards it from lower workings or sinking upon it from the surface - or lower levels, is a manifest, and paramount necessity in the practical mining of the day. Such a method was suggested by a gentleman of high scientific attainments in Melbourne, and consisted simply of three glass phials, tilled in the first instance with glycerine, but this was changed to glycerine and oil, with* a- magnetic 1 needle suspended in each of them. These were let down through the boring tubes and the result showed that the drill had deflected to an extent of 50 feet from the initial bearing of the bore, also that the magnetic bearing was nearly north-east: It therefore behoves the directors of companies using diamond drills to be prepared for emergencies i ml not to be discouraged if, in prospecti-.g for a ret}f with the drill, they should fail to dis cover it on the first attempt. Tim diamond drill may, as it Iras already done at Beaufort, be the means of

developing on the West Coast immensely rich sources of wealth, and we hope that ere long it may be tried in this district, in order that the question may be set at rest whether or not there are far richer deposits under the so-called “old man reef” than has been proved to exist on the surface. Mining experience has shown that in the majority of cases where there are rich alluvial deposits near the surface, far richer exist at a greater depth, and the inhabitants of the West Coast should never rest satisfied till the mystery of that deposit of mud, miscalled a reef, has been solved.